14th October from the West Cliff Green, Bournemouth
A gloomy, sombre sort of day. The sea seems sluggish and oily. A little cold wind stirs things up. Little flurries of leaves swirl down from the trees. A squirrel crosses the path gripping a large, prickly sweet chestnut case in its mouth. It is prepared to suffer for supper. Although pied wagtails are usually about in pairs their seem to be a number of juveniles bobbing about on their own. One twitters repeatedly from the back of a bench. The West Cliff Green is a space that can assume any one of an infinite number of meanings, depending on the filter that it is looked through. Thus, despite its quotidian atmosphere to most users, it is often used as a place of remembrance. The benches all have little plaques and there are often bunches of flowers tied to the rails or in little pots on the clifftop. Occasionally, little piles of white ash. Undying love is remembered by the little padlocks clipped onto the fence. Today there is the sort of floral tribute more usually seen in a memorial garden to DAD.
14th October 2021
The short, cliff top turf is lush and vivid green in the early light. It is overlain with tissue of silver studded with masses of tiny rainbow jewels from the heavy dew. A long filament of thick white mist stretches from the harbour mouth right across the bay. It is pulled out like a roll of cotton wool, barely touching the slate grey sea while above it I can see the dark tops of the Purbeck hills and the massing clouds and above that a clear, translucent blue sky. #Bournemouth #WestCliff #Autumn #Dawn
